TY - JOUR
T1 - Legal cynicism, but not depression, mediates the link between adverse environmental factors and youth’s political violence support
AU - Jahnke, Sara
AU - Koch, Tobias
AU - Goede, Laura Romina
AU - Schröder, Carl Philipp
AU - Lehmann, Lena
AU - Beelmann, Andreas
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - The present work tests mediators of the link between adverse environmental factors and political violence support. Specifically, we investigated if depression and legal cynicism can mediate the association between lack of family cohesion, parental violence, and discrimination on one side and political violence support on the other side. Hypotheses were tested on a large and ethnically diverse dataset of German ninth graders, employing multi-group structural equation modeling. For both genders, we find that lack of family cohesion and parental violence were directly and/or indirectly related to political violence support. While legal cynicism mediated the link between lack of family cohesion and parental violence and political violence support, we found no moderating effect of depression in any of the tested models. These findings indicate that adolescents from dysfunctional families and with cynical attitudes towards legal norms may be at risk to endorse political violence. Prevention efforts that enhance family functioning, social-cognitive abilities, and the internalization of legal norms may deter youth from supporting political violence.
AB - The present work tests mediators of the link between adverse environmental factors and political violence support. Specifically, we investigated if depression and legal cynicism can mediate the association between lack of family cohesion, parental violence, and discrimination on one side and political violence support on the other side. Hypotheses were tested on a large and ethnically diverse dataset of German ninth graders, employing multi-group structural equation modeling. For both genders, we find that lack of family cohesion and parental violence were directly and/or indirectly related to political violence support. While legal cynicism mediated the link between lack of family cohesion and parental violence and political violence support, we found no moderating effect of depression in any of the tested models. These findings indicate that adolescents from dysfunctional families and with cynical attitudes towards legal norms may be at risk to endorse political violence. Prevention efforts that enhance family functioning, social-cognitive abilities, and the internalization of legal norms may deter youth from supporting political violence.
KW - depression
KW - Extremism
KW - political orientations
KW - political violence
KW - radicalization
KW - youth
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85103625283&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/1068316X.2021.1909022
DO - 10.1080/1068316X.2021.1909022
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85103625283
SN - 1068-316X
JO - Psychology, Crime and Law
JF - Psychology, Crime and Law
ER -